Paths Not Taken
by Selena
Summary: Five things which never happened between Garak and Bashir.
1. Our Man Bashir

Diclaimer: All owned by Paramount.  
  
Thanks to: Basingstoke and Te, for inventing the "Five Things" concept; Kathy, for beta-reading.  
  
Author's note: Dedicated to Altariel1, who asked for it a long time ago.

* * *

I. Our Man Bashir„Computer, exit!"Garak called. The cave around them wavered; then the illusion broke down, and they were left in the cold net of yellow and black.  
  
But the door of the holosuite was open.  
  
Bashir couldn't believe what had happened. Staring at Garak, he hastily ordered the computer to restore the program, or at least the images of the five key players he named. The computer, sounding endlessly kind and patient, told him that was impossible. The overload had been too much; they had been wiped out.  
  
Over the com link, he could hear Eddington's voice asking what the hell was happening, why the station had suddenly got its power back, why Bashir wasn't answering.  
  
"I'm sorry, Doctor," Garak said, and the worst thing was that he sounded sincere. But then, when didn't he?  
  
"You killed them," Bashir whispered. "Dax...Miles... Sisko... Kira... Worf... they are all dead."  
  
"But we aren't," Garak said mildly. "And you'll have to forgive me if I prefer it that way."  
  
They looked at each other, and Bashir knew that forgiveness of any kind was dead between them.

* * *

Over the next few days, Bashir wanted nothing more than to remain in his room. Even treating an entire army of wounded non-stop in the infirmary would have been preferable to what he actually had to do. There was a counsellor on the station, and Eddington volunteered to tell Keiko O'Brien and Jake, but Bashir knew very well he would have betrayed both his friends and his oath if he accepted either way out. So he sat with Keiko as she cried and held her hand when Molly curled against her, helplessly crying as well. He tried awkward shoulder pats with Jake, who didn't cry but walked around numb and stunned, refusing to take any of the tranquillizers Keiko had accepted. Perhaps Jadzia would have found a way to get through to Jake; but Jadzia was lost as well. The calls to the Trill homeworld were actually a relief, because they permitted Bashir to yell at the Symbiosis commission with their obvious anger not over the loss of Jadzia, but of Dax.  
  
Kasidy Yates wasn't on the station and wouldn't return for another two weeks; they weren't sure whether or not to tell her through the barren means of subspace communication, and Jake was in no condition to decide. Kira didn't have any family left. Those of her old resistance group who were still alive held a memorial service in the station's temple. It wasn't very well attended, not after Kai Winn had used the opportunity to insinuate Kira's death, together with the Emissary, might have been a sign from the Prophets that both had erred by going against their chosen Kai on numerous occasions.  
  
None of them knew Worf's human foster parents or his son, so Eddington decided to call Worf's former commanding officer, who would surely be a more suitable person to break the news. This somehow resulted in the Enterprise people coming to the station for an investigation, and just when Bashir thought everything couldn't get worse, it did.  
  
"There are discrepancies in the two testimonies," the android, Data, declared. "Mr. Garak said he called for the door because the holosuite's failsafes were off, the program's villain had trapped you and you were in danger of dying in molten lava. However, your phrasing, Doctor, is 'we were escaping through the tunnels from the lava, and Garak, believing we would die, called for an exit.' Which does indicate you were not in immediate danger of death any longer."  
  
Bashir saw the point at once. So did Eddington and Odo, who had spent the days after Kira's death speaking less than ten words unrelated to his job. Now life returned into his frozen, unformed face, while Eddington frowned.  
  
"Doctor," Odo growled, "did Garak murder them?"  
  
Because that was what it came down to, Bashir thought. If Garak had called for the door while in danger of imminent death, all those deaths were horrible accidents. If, on the other hand, Garak had made a calculated decision to risk everyone dying while there were other alternatives, it was manslaughter at the very least.  
  
Everyone looked at him, expectantly. He felt sick. The anger and horror about what Garak had done was still boiling in him, and the guilt of having let it happen was eating him alive. On the other hand, he could make an educated guess what would happen if he said Garak _had_ killed everyone. His asylum on the station would be revoked; they would extradite him to Cardassia, and with Dukat as the chief military advisor of the Detapa Council and no Enabran Tain to intervene on Garak's behalf, a swift trial, ending with the inevitable Cardassian death sentence, was more than likely.  
  
His tunic was still crumpled from another sleepless night in the quarters of the O'Brien's, and he had stains from Keiko's tears on it. On his way to the security office, he had passed Quark's, where the dart board still hung, and had seen Nog, who probably wouldn't go to Starfleet without Captain Sisko to sponsor him, earnestly, quietly talking to an unresponsive Jake. And seeing Odo burn with rage, he finally understood what had eluded him for so long, just as it had escaped everyone else. Odo had loved Kira. Seeing her memory twisted by Winn had been even worse for him than it had been for the rest of them, and if he could make someone pay for it, he would. And why not? It would only be just. Didn't everyone deserve to see justice done?  
  
He knew what Garak, in his place, would tell them. There was no doubt about what Garak would do, not any longer, if there ever had been.  
  
Still, Bashir didn't know what he would reply until he finally opened his mouth and said it.

* * *

Garak caught up with him on the way to the replimat.  
  
"I just had the most fascinating conversation with Constable Odo," he said, "and I would like..."  
  
"Stop it," Bashir said. "I don't care whether you want to be clever, or whether you actually want to thank me. Just – don't. I didn't do it for you."  
  
Unless he was very much mistaken, there was some compassion in Garak's blue eyes as the Cardassian said:  
  
"I know. You did it because you can't stand the idea of lives being lost. Even mine. You are a doctor, after all."  
  
He touched Bashir's hand with his own, which was, as always, inhumanly warm. It was a fleeting contact, not quite a handshake, and for a second, Bashir let it happen before he stepped back.  
  
"I'm a liar," he said tonelessly. "But that's nothing new, either. You think you're such an expert in lies, Garak, but you have no idea. But I know what it's like to live a lie, and that's what you are going to do from now on. Don't be surprised if Jake visits your shop this afternoon. I told him you want to talk with him about what a wonderful man his father was, and how he saved your life repeatedly. And Keiko decided Molly needs new clothes, too."  
  
_"After all,"_ said the voice of Enabran Tain in his memory, _"a life in exile for Garak is no life at all."_  
  
He had stood there, listening to Tain's sardonic tones and the explanation of why Tain would help as Bashir had asked him to, and had not understood when Tain told him he wished Garak to live, a long life, surrounded by people who hated him. How anyone could twist an act of mercy for someone he had obvious feelings for into a refined kind of punishment.  
  
"What a lovely sentiment," Garak said, echoing Bashir's words from years ago, but with a strange kind of excitement instead of the youthful indignation Bashir had felt at the time. Still, he gave Tain's old answer. What else was there to say, after all?  
  
"And it comes straight from the heart." 


	2. Dr Bashir, I Presume?

II. Dr. Bashir, I presume?  
  
It wasn't too difficult to let himself into Bashir's quarters. He had done it before. You'd think the good doctor would have had the entry code changed after that, but no. How fortunate that Garak wasn't given to overinterpreting certain gestures.  
  
Bashir sat on the floor, knees drawn up, dark head buried in his arms. When Garak entered, he looked up. "Not you, too," he said listlessly. "How did you find out already?"  
  
Garak went to him and sat down beside him. "Now I'm trying to decide whether I should be insulted that you don't want my company, or that you underestimate my capabilities. After all, Dr. Zimmerman is hardly the most discreet of individuals."  
  
Despite the seriousness of the situation, Bashir managed to look just the slightest bit embarrassed. It emphasized his youth, though Garak hoped the doctor would never lose the ability to blush. It suited him too well.  
  
"It's not that," Bashir protested. "I... Garak, it's all true. What Zimmerman said. And don't give me that speech about my inner worth, Miles already did that."  
  
"I do pride myself too much on being original to imitate the chief, Doctor."  
  
"Doctor. That's a laugh. I won't be for much longer. I don't know how they handle genetically enhanced people on Cardassia, Garak, but they're not allowed to serve in Starfleet. Or to be doctors, at all, in the entire Federation."  
  
"And here I thought I was supposed to be the one coming from an intolerant, ideological society," Garak observed mildly. With interest he noted that Bashir flushed again. For a quite different reason, it seemed, for as the young man rose, anger laced his voice.  
  
"I'm not up to trading witticisms while my life falls apart," he said. "Go away."  
  
Garak remained where he was, on the ground. Federation quarters were so impersonal, he thought; you could count the items in this room which made it Julian Bashir's instead of a random other officer's on two hands. Well, it wasn't as if Bashir would have to endure these sterile, unimaginative boxes for much longer.  
  
"You forget, Doctor... Julian," he amended, when Bashir flinched at the title, "I am quite the expert at what to do when one's life falls apart. I doubt any of your colleagues has the same experience."  
  
_And this is what it comes down to_, he thought, when Bashir slowly, hesitatingly sat down again. _They won't be able to help you, none of them. I wouldn't be surprised if Sisko weren't the tiniest bit offended himself. He takes being deceived rather personally, does the good Captain, especially after being made a fool of by Eddington. As for Dax, she might have falsified your records herself; she's quite capable of that. But it's too late now, and she's no longer a legendary figure Federation officials would listen to. The Chief might rail at the injustice of it all to everyone who'll listen, and who knows, he might even shed a manly tear for you. But he won't be able to help you. Only I can do that.  
_  
"I'm sorry," Bashir said. "I know you mean well. But I can't let you do anything..."  
  
"Oh, I'm not going to kill Zimmerman for you," Garak said pleasantly. "Really, try to wipe out one's enemy in advance and one's reputation is shot to pieces."  
  
Bashir shook his head. "You would have committed genocide," he replied, "if Worf hadn't stopped you."  
  
And that was when something else had stopped as well, hadn't it? Bashir had visited him during the ridiculously short time the Federation had seen it fit to confine Garak for attempting something most of the brass undoubtedly wished could have succeeded. But afterwards, their daily lunches had become weekly again, and then twice a month. Judging by the amount of time Bashir spent in the holosuites with O'Brien, it wasn't because the doctor suddenly lacked spare time.  
  
"I would have saved my world, and yours," Garak said, "but that is neither here nor there. Believe it or not, Julian, I was only going to offer my advice on how to deal with exile and a change of profession."  
  
Bashir sighed. "Sorry," he said again. "I guess we really are in the same boat now, you and I, aren't we?"  
  
Garak put a hand on his shoulder, and felt Bashir lean into his touch just the tiniest bit.  
  
"Yes, we are," he returned. "And why not make that literally?"  
  
For a while, Bashir said nothing, which hardly ever happened. You could see something struggling and breaking behind his eyes, though, racing for alternatives and finding all alleys of escape closed. The Federation law concerning genetic enhancements offered no loop hole; Garak had familiarized himself with it quite thoroughly. If necessary, he was prepared to point out what had happened to those genetically enhanced children who, as opposed to Bashir, were found out. It was what made this entire gamble so very risky. After all, he did not want Bashir to end up tranquillized in some cross between clinic and prison.  
  
"Julian," Garak said, offering a bridge to save Bashir's pride, "you know how I hate life on this station. Admittedly, since Dukat has made my return to Cardassia quite impossible for as long as the Dominion is still around, I have no realistic prospect of ever going home, but then again, there are still a lot of areas to explore left in space. Entire races, dare I say, who would welcome a doctor without asking for any Federation licences. Who knows, they might even offer acceptable lunch meals."  
  
This earned him the ghost of a smile.  
  
"I suppose it would still be frontier medicine," Bashir finally said, and once again, struggled to stand up. He held a hand out to Garak.  
  
"Thank you," he added, and while he started to pack and Garak elaborated on the kind of transports they could take before the day was over, the Cardassian knew it had been worth it. He had started to investigate Bashir's past ages ago, when the Doctor first ceased to be an entertaining diversion and become a daily fixture; of course he had never mentioned what he had found out to anyone, least of all Bashir.  
  
But there was only so much to occupy one's time with if one was confined to Constable Odo's holding cells, or to waiting for hours until certain people deigned to show up after their dart board games, if they didn't forget altogether. When he had heard about the Federation's plans to create a new long term medical hologram, one modelled on a living doctor, he had seen his chance. Planting a campaign for Bashir had been easy, so very easy. Zimmerman, thankfully, had done the rest.  
  
This was the end of his exile on Terok Nor then, and he would not miss the place one bit. The only person he would miss was Ziyal, and she was far better off without clinging on to her somewhat misguided affection. Her father had already presented her with a harsh dose of reality; she did not need to be disillusioned about him as well, as she inevitably would have been if Garak would ever permit her to get closer.  
  
Bashir, now, Bashir was that rare thing, an idealist and a deceiver at the same time. He was worth a lifetime of study, and that was what they would get. Perhaps, at one future point, Garak would even tell him how this had come about.  
  
Echoing his thoughts, Bashir suddenly stopped packing, looked straight at Garak and said:  
  
"You've saved my life, you know."  
  
"Yes," Garak replied. "I know." 


	3. Sacrifice Of Angels

III. Sacrifice of Angels  
  
The whole thing started when Ziyal returned from Dukat's funeral. Bashir, concerned about the girl ever since they had found her with her dead father in her arms, waited at the docking bay. In his opinion, she shouldn't have been allowed to leave the station so quickly afterwards on a journey that took several days and was bound to be upsetting.  
  
But Kai Winn and Shakaar had both refused permission for Dukat to be buried on Bajor, and Bashir suspected Kira hadn't fought them too hard on that matter. In return, Ziyal had refused to even consider letting her father's body be sent to Cardassia. In the end she had decided he should be buried next to her mother on the planet where he and Kira had found Ziyal.  
  
That Garak had gone with Ziyal had been somewhat surprising, given the well- known enmity between him and Dukat, but then Garak and Ziyal had become friends, and besides, the only other person joining Ziyal on that trip had been Major Kira, hardly a friend of the Gul's, either. In fact, between the three of them, Garak was the only one who actually knew how Cardassians buried their dead. Yes, it did make sense, and yet Bashir would have felt better if the traumatized young girl hadn't been allowed out of the sight of a physician or a counsellor for so long.  
  
When the runabout had docked, Kira was the first to emerge, with tightly pressed lips and looking distinctly unhappy. Then came Ziyal and Garak, and Bashir froze.  
  
They were holding hands. Of course, it was nothing new that Ziyal had developed something of a crush on Garak. But that had not been mutual. Bashir had always assumed Garak was letting Ziyal down gently, and in a way that ensured he still had some friendly company. Encouraging her with these sort of gestures was hardly kind, though presumably Garak meant well.  
  
A few days later, Kira informed everyone at Ops grimly, with an expression that made it clear she didn't want to talk about it, that Garak and Ziyal were now engaged.  
  
"That's crazy," Bashir told O'Brien when they were restaging the Alamo.  
  
"You bet it is," O'Brien returned. "Who in their right mind would want to marry that Cardassian bastard?"  
  
O'Brien still hadn't forgotten the Empok Nor incident, no matter how often Bashir told him Garak had not been himself on that occasion. Given O'Brien's past with Cardassians, such a reaction was all too comprehensible.  
  
"Someone ought to talk with the girl," O'Brien continued, looking for another tin soldier, and frowning in his endearing pater familias way. "I can't understand why Kira is letting this happen."  
  
An awkward pause told them that neither of them was exactly good at estimating what went on with Kira these days. In a way, Bashir felt guilty. The war had been hard on all of them, but Kira had been the one actually living with the Cardassians these last months. She had been the one who had to pretend working with Dukat instead of fighting the open war the others could allow themselves. And she had been the one for whom Ziyal had turned against her father, leading to his death at the hands of an enraged Damar who had meant to shoot the Gul's daughter.  
  
Perhaps that was why Kira was letting it happen. Because she felt she owed Ziyal something. Which was understandable, but still not right.  
  
"Well, you could..." Bashir began, and O'Brien immediately interrupted him, holding up a scolding finger.  
  
"Absolutely not, Julian. I hardly know her that well. You're the one who had lunch with her and Garak on a regular basis."  
  
"Coward," Bashir muttered, but resigned himself to his fate.

* * *

When Ziyal had first come to the station, you could see the awkward teenager struggling with the emerging women. There was nothing child-like left in her now as she politely accepted the raktijino Bashir had ordered for her. Shadows lingered around her eyes, but he could not detect any bloodshot vessels anymore; if she had been crying recently, it didn't show.  
  
"Look," he said into the silence that had followed his explanation on why he had wanted to talk to her, "it's not that I don't think well of Garak, but..."  
  
"Of course you do," Ziyal said in her low, pleasant voice. "But you don't think very highly of me, it seems."  
  
She waited till he had finished protesting, and then continued:  
  
"No, you don't. You think I don't know what I'm doing, because my father died, but that's another subject none of you want to talk about. It was so much easier for you when you could just hate him and blame him for the entire war, wasn't it?"  
  
"Now Ziyal, that's not fair."  
  
"No," she said, anger creeping into her even tone, "and I'm tired of being fair to everyone. I tried to be, I tried so hard, and it still wasn't enough. He's dead. But that's not why I'm marrying Garak. I've known Garak for nearly two years now, Doctor, just as long as Commander Dax has known Commander Worf, but you don't protest against their wedding plans, do you?"  
  
Bashir swallowed his immediate reply, which would have led them into a tangent that had nothing to do with the subject at hand.  
  
"I think," he said carefully, "you could know Garak for a lifetime without ever figuring him out. I certainly haven't been able to."  
  
"Well, you're not marrying him," Ziyal returned, and then bit her lip. "I'm sorry," she said. "That was uncalled for."  
  
The apology was a needle stabbing at a spot he hadn't noticed was sore. He wouldn't have given the original remark another thought, and why did she assume otherwise? What did she want to imply?  
  
"Oh, it's nothing," he said, more to say anything at all than because he meant it. Obviously, he was wasting his time here. Really, why had he thought she'd listen to him if she didn't listen to Kira, whom she loved?  
  
Love. That was it. That would be his final argument.  
  
"Did he ever tell you he loved you?" Bashir asked, embarrassed at sounding absurdly young in front of this young girl, and resenting her just the slightest bit for it.  
  
"He never broke a promise to me," said Ziyal, which was no answer at all.

* * *

"My dear Doctor," Garak said, putting the sizing scanner he was using on a shimmering green fabric down, "you amaze me. Commander Dax and Commander Worf are getting married, and it is only a matter of time before our valiant Captain and the lovely Kasidy Yates tie the knot. Rom and your charming former ladyfriend are newlyweds. The Chief inspires us all with his unbreakable devotion to his wife. After all these advertisements for the blessed state of matrimony it is _my_ intention to join it that you object to? How disappointing. I'd hate to conclude all that Federation benevolence does not stop you from being jealous."  
  
He couldn't believe what he was hearing. That Garak would actually say this to him.  
  
"I'm not..." Bashir began heatedly.  
  
"...and you don't have to be," Garak interrupted him, amusement dancing in his eyes and around the corners of his mouth. "I don't think Quark will marry again any time soon, so you won't be the only bachelor left on the station."  
  
For a moment, Bashir felt like he was standing near the edge of a rock, surrounded by a strange, glittering sea. Visiting the Founder's homeworld had been like this when he had accompanied Odo to the latter's judgement. There was no safe and fixed point anywhere on the horizon, and he wasn't at all sure whether he could swim in such an ocean.  
  
Then he decided to accept the fixed point of yesteryear, and replied, with as easy an air as he could muster:  
  
"Ah, but you don't know about Jadzia's plans to secretly elope with me on the night before the wedding."  
  
"You'll never become a passable spy," Garak said disapprovingly. "Secrets are meant to remain unspoken."  
  
Now that they were on safe bantering ground again, Bashir suddenly thought he couldn't let it rest like that.  
  
"But you used to tell me secrets all the time," he said. "Never mind if they were true or not, you were quite communicative about them. So tell me, Garak – what can you possibly have in common with a young distraught girl like Ziyal?"  
  
Garak took the green, shimmering cloth up and let it glide between his fingers. He had quite remarkable hands, strong and supple, similar to O'Brien's, not thin and breakable like Bashir's own.  
  
"Aside from being exiles, you mean? Aside from being bastards of fathers with the unfortunate tendency to confuse their greatness with the greatness of the state? Aside from being cursed to love those parents, to watch them self-destruct and then to watch them die? Why, I can't think of a thing, unless you count a shared sense of aesthetics. Ziyal is quite the gifted artist, do you know that?" he asked, and then added, all notes of irony, teasing or bitterness gone from his voice: "And I find the sensation of being needed quite pleasant. I can't think of another person who needs me the way she does. Can you, Doctor?"  
  
There they were back on the precipice again. Bashir's throat felt dry, and he swallowed. It had been hot on the Founder's planet as well. And he hadn't even known back then that Garak was prepared kill him, along with Sisko, Odo and an entire race of beings who might or might not be the greatest danger the Federation had ever faced.  
  
When Worf, full of indignation, had reported the entire event once the landing party beamed back to the Defiant, Bashir had been shocked but not truly surprised. Because that was the thing about Garak: he had his priorities, and a person could never, ever be that priority, or hope to change his ethics, no matter what he might claim. You could build a friendship on that, but you couldn't possibly build more, and it seemed Ziyal had to be the unlucky person who would find this out the hard way.  
  
"No," Bashir replied, turning away, "I can't think of anyone. Anyone at all." 


	4. The Die Is Cast

IV. The Die Is Cast  
  
There weren't many visitors that were granted immediate access to the head of the Obsidian Order, and certainly no one who wasn't Cardassian. Still, his faithful housekeeper Mila did not blink when she was confronted with the human young man who gave her a nervous, charming smile.  
  
"He's been expecting you," she said simply, and invited him in. "I'll prepare some Tarkelian tea, yes?" she added, and withdrew.  
  
Julian Bashir wasn't surprised to discover that the house on Cardassia Prime resembled Tain's retirement home on the Aeroth Colony; friendly, bright colours and furniture that spoke of a comfortable living but no too suspicious wealth. The only difference he could detect were some drawings that looked vaguely Bajoran.  
  
"Do you like them?" asked the new head of the Obsidian Order. "I hoped you would, Doctor. I missed our discussions about art, you know."  
  
Bashir looked at his host. Garak hadn't changed since the day he left DS9 with no luggage but some Delvian chocolates. Same civilian clothing, decidedly nothing military about him, same black hair almost at shoulder length, same amused expression as if he knew the universe was a joke, but decided to play along anyway.  
  
"I missed them, too," Bashir answered, which was true. "Frankly, Garak, I missed _you_."  
  
He couldn't be sure, but he thought he saw something flickering in Garak's eyes.  
  
"That's... very flattering, Doctor," Garak said, and made a motion inviting Bashir to sit down on one of the chairs standing there. They were made of triangular forms, which given the Cardassian fondness for this particular geometrical structure wasn't surprising. "Given the manner of my departure, I didn't think you would."  
  
Mila returned with the tea and an actual human-style tea pot and cups. It reminded Bashir of the occasional afternoon with the O'Briens, when Keiko had brought out the Japanese dishes she explained couldn't be matched by any recycled items. Not that he had seen Miles and his family in recent years. O'Brien had made his disapproval for Bashir's choices more than clear.  
  
After she had poured tea for both of them and had left again, Bashir said:  
  
"What, because you took your chance and returned to your people? I never expected you to do anything else. I have to admit I was shocked about what your fleet did to the Founders, but that was Tain's decision, wasn't it? And you explained Cardassian hierarchy to me well enough for me to understand that he would have killed you if you had gone up against him."  
  
He sipped something of the tea, which was just right, with the sweetness balanced perfectly by the intense flavour of the Tarkelian leaves.  
  
"Kira and the others are another matter, of course," he added quietly. "They might agree that the Dominion would have invaded the Alpha Quadrant otherwise, but they'll never be able to forget that stopping it cost Odo's life."  
  
Garak said, full of sincere regret: "I would have saved him if I could have. But after Tain had found out that his original Romulan ally had actually been a Founder, he wasn't taking any more chances. He ordered Odo's execution on the spot, before he even had his first conversation with me."  
  
They sat in silence for a while, while Garak drank his tea as well. When he had finished, Bashir took the pot and refilled his cup, with the careful, elegant movements he had practised for quite some time.  
  
"You're quite good at that," Garak said.  
  
"Mrs O'Brien taught me," Bashir replied. "Before she and the Chief left the station, of course."  
  
"Did they really?" Garak said, eyes widened in what was surely faked surprise. Given how the Order prided itself on thoroughness, Bashir was quite certain Garak had known about this already.  
  
"With the Cardassian Empire stretching out in the Gamma Quadrant, Miles felt DS9 wasn't a safe place for his family anymore. Jake's back on Earth, too, with his grandfather."  
  
Garak clicked his tongue.  
  
"Paranoia is such a nasty habit."  
  
"Isn't it," Bashir said drily, and Garak laughed.  
  
"That's why you're here," he said, sounding glad and relieved at the same time. "You really haven't changed, Doctor. It is something of a relief, to tell you the truth. I do like my universe to have some constants. No doubt when you're eighty you'll still try to play secret agent, investigating potential villains in their lair."  
  
"No, Garak," Bashir murmured, leaning back in his chair, tea cup in his hands, and feeling the triangular shape pressing into his back, "I stopped thinking of you as a potential villain quite some time ago."  
  
"So why did you come?" Garak asked, after he had joined Bashir in sipping some more tea. His voice definitely had a teasing undertone now.  
  
Bashir held out his right hand over the short table between them. After a moment of hesitation, Garak took it. With his fingers touching Garak's wrist, Bashir could feel his pulse.  
  
"Because I want you to forgive me," he said, as Garak had done, once upon a time. Garak recognised the quote immediately. He did not move, but the pulse under Bashir's fingertips quickened, which meant the poison would reach his heart even faster.  
  
"I finally learned your lesson," Bashir said. "Section 31 recruited me after your people wiped out the Maquis with the biogenetic weapons left by the Founders. _Your_ people, Garak, not Tain's. He was already dead by then. That was when I finally understood, and I promised to do whatever it takes to stop you."  
  
He knew he would die as well, and that was only fitting. There was nothing left of Julian Bashir now. Jules might have died when his parents took him to be redesigned in the image they craved, but Julian died when watching the incoming Maquis die of the Quickening because they had refused to leave the Demilitarised Zone. Julian had died when trying to find a cure, and failing, and knowing that he could have stopped this from ever happening if he hadn't saved Garak's life after the implant had failed. What was left walking and talking and taking death back to death's favourite blue-eyed boy wasn't Julian Bashir; it was his ghost.  
  
The poison was designed to paralyse Garak's nervous system as quickly as possible, so he wouldn't be able to cry out. Or speak, for that matter. Nonetheless Bashir couldn't keep himself from repeating:  
  
"I want you to forgive me. I need to know that someone forgives me."  
  
Garak's hand grasped his and did not let go. It might have been a death reflex; Bashir couldn't tell. He only knew that he wouldn't have withdrawn even if he could have. So he kept sitting with Garak long after Garak's body had slackened, and the tea had grown irrevocably cold. 


	5. By Inferno's Light

V. By Inferno's Light  
  
Garak had failed, and this angered him almost as much as the fact his death, and the death of Julian Bashir, was now imminent. What was worse, he had failed at the very last moment, after enduring hour after hour in that miserable little hellhole. It should have worked; he, Bashir and the others should have been on board the runabout and on their way back to the station now.  
  
Instead, Worf had been shot together with the Jem'Hadar First, the Breen and the Romulan were dead as well, and the only reason why Martok was still alive and would remain so was because the Dominion didn't have many high- ranking Klingon prisoners. Actually, they didn't have many Klingon prisoners, full stop, given the Klingon tendency to prefer a dramatic death to capture. Personally, Garak would have been all for continued internment now their only means of escape had been discovered, but it seemed he no longer had the option.  
  
"The new ruler of Cardassia changed his mind," the Vorta informed him. "He decided to be merciful. Instead of spending a lifetime in the custody of the Dominion, you are to die a quick death." Sounding insufferably smug, he added. "And since you were so eager to leave us, I decided it should be on the surface of this asteroid. Both of you," he ended, nodding towards Bashir, who was pushed to walk along side Garak.  
  
Bashir looked horrible, full of bruises, even thinner than usual and as dirty as Garak recalled the workers at orb processing to have been. Not too surprising, considering the doctor had spent weeks in isolation, presumably without a shower. Somehow, this infuriated Garak even further. Bashir didn't belong here, in the eternal grey shades of a prison camp. He belonged on that station with its overly bright light and eternally cold temperatures, soft, brown skin glistening with health and the uniform just the slightest bit crumpled.  
  
"I'm sorry, Doctor," Garak said, meaning the entire mess, as they stumbled through the corridors that would lead them to the surface and their deaths.  
  
"It's not your fault," Bashir replied in his earnest bedside manner, which surely was not appropriate right now. Or all too appropriate, given that the good Doctor must have practice consoling the dying. "You tried."  
  
"And in doing so condemned us all, as the late Enabran Tain put it so adroitly," Garak said drily. After a while, he added. "I let him down, too. He did believe me when I said I would remain alive and make the Dominion pay, you know."  
  
He felt Bashir's hand on his shoulder.  
  
"Garak," Bashir said, "Garak, he's dead. Stop letting him have such power over you."  
  
"Ah, but I'm afraid that is the problem with lifelong habits, Doctor. They take a lifetime to shed, and mine is about to be cut drastically short. Pity. Tain was right about one thing – a man really shouldn't allow his enemies to outlive him."  
  
Bashir stopped walking, and for some reason, the Jem'Hadar guards did not immediately reprimand him. He put the other hand on Garak's right shoulder, and said, pronouncing each word with the intensity that was his as surely as youth and curiosity and an incurable optimism was: "When I saw you in that cell, after all those months here, I felt like a drowning man who had finally found a rope. You did a brave and incredible thing, coming here, and there is no one I – "  
  
At that point, the Jem'Hadars' patience obviously ran out. The guard standing next to Bashir pushed him forward. Once the contact was broken, several opportune replies occurred to Garak, as well as the conclusion he shouldn't have let Bashir listen to that last conversation between him and Enabran Tain. After all, the barren truth was just an excuse for a lack of imagination, and Bashir should never have been exposed to it. Whatever he had wanted from Bashir, it had never been pity. Perhaps it wasn't too late yet for some face-saving witticism.  
  
In the end, though, what he said was: "I think they'll find out about your replacement on the station before he can do any harm, Doctor. You don't have to worry about him."  
  
"And why is that, Garak?" Bashir said, sounding more as if the exhaustion of the last days had finally caught up with him.  
  
"Because he doesn't have your strange tendency to believe the best of people despite all evidence to the contrary, and hence not a tenth of your charm, of course. No Changeling could ever reproduce either."  
  
"Wait," the guard at Garak's side told them. They had arrived in front of yet another door, but this time the duranium steel was covered with a series of markings. The Jem'Hadar took a step back after touching some control panels. The door hissed open, and showed a short, barren tunnel, ending in another steel plate marked in red.  
  
"Go through the door," his guard told Garak. For a moment, Garak considered trying a surprise attack. But he wasn't Worf, and knew very well that he wouldn't last three minutes against one Jem'Hadar, let alone two. Bashir in his present condition wouldn't do much better. Besides, even if they managed to overwhelm both guards by some miracle, there truly was nowhere to go. Even their shuttle had been discovered, brought in and disassembled by now. It would only end in some humiliating beatings and them shoved through the door all the same, and really, there were more agreeable ways to spend one's last moments.  
  
Bashir looked at him, apparently considering the same thing and coming to the same conclusion.  
  
"I know you don't care for Shakespeare, but you'll have to forgive one last attempt to convince you of his merits," he said, and, holding out his hand, quoted: "If it be now, 'tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now: if it be not now, yet it will come; the readiness is all."  
  
"Like his entire work, this is somewhat obvious," Garak replied, took Bashir's hand, and followed him through the door, which immediately closed behind them. The human skin under his fingertips felt as alien and compelling as ever. Strange; Bashir had examined him often enough for it to feel thoroughly familiar.  
  
The young man squeezed his hand just a little harder than was necessary, which wasn't surprising. No matter how brave, nobody faced impending death by vacuum without a healthy dose of fear. As the outer doors began to open, Garak decided he might as well do something about it.  
  
Pulling Bashir closer and turning him so he faced the inner doors, he did what he had dreamt of for longer than he cared to admit. As first kisses went, it was somewhat clumsy and awkward, but he felt the hesitant, desperate warmth of Bashir's mouth, and then he didn't feel anything any more. 


End file.
